Team

Inspired by his travels apprentice butcher Bob has created a ‘Yorkshire Merguez’ sausage. Mildly spiced including rich red paprika the sausage is made with select cuts of Swillington organic beef and lamb which he minces, mixes with spices and hand links into sausages.

Swillington Organic Farm in Yorkshire have been recognised as one of the top small agricultural businesses in Britain. The family run farm have been shortlisted for ‘Farming Partnership of the Year’ in the British Farming Awards.

The British Farming awards celebrate the creative thinking, innovation and dedication of Britain’s farmers in ever changing and challenging conditions and climates. The awards are about recognising farmers who are taking positive steps to achieving a bigger and better business thanks to the innovations they have made.

Innovative Agriculture

Jo Cartwright has been running Swillington Organic Farm, just outside Leeds, since 1981 and, by her own admission, had been struggling to make the farm a success ever since. The farm has been fully organic for 14 years and Jo opened one of the first organic farm shops in Yorkshire, later adding an on-farm butchery and slaughter unit to improve traceability.

However, she says her son Ed was always the one with a head for business. “I started selling on farmers markets helped by Ed (then 12), right from the start he had a keen business sense and had good ideas on marketing.”

Following his degree and involvement in local food with deliciouslyorkshire and the Leeds University Food Society Ed started a meat box scheme, initially doing everything including packing boxes and deliveries – the team now includes a part-time delivery driver and packer leaving Ed to concentrate on developing the business.

Shared values

Other initiatives include a community-supported agriculture scheme (the first to be started in Yorkshire) and Kids club, a chicken co-op, an egg club and educational visits with the focus on food production.

Jo says, she and Ed each have their own areas of expertise: “Mine is a lifetime of working with stock and growing. I am also passionate about conservation and farming and making them work together. Ed’s is spending time and effort to communicate what we do to our customers, we share our story on social media and put on Meat Ups to invite our customers to experience the story behind their food.

I do the farming and Ed does ‘the clean stuff’ which suits us both as I’m not a natural saleswoman!”

Ed is optimistic about the future of the business and sees being shortlisted for the national award as a great achievement. “We’ve won awards for the quality of the food we produce, but this is all about the business and how working together we’re growing organically and helping provide the connection between field and fork that the community want and supermarkets can never offer.

Meatboxes, butchered on the farm and delivered across the UK, have been key to the farm’s growth

“This is a great time to be involved in local food, our business grew throughout the recession and month on month we are consecutively getting more and more subscribers for our meat boxes. This demand for our meat boxes is allowing us to continually invest and grow the business in line with the values that founded it.”

The farm’s recent agreement to graze the land on a neighbouring RSPB nature reserve means they can grow production to meet demand whilst still keeping the exacting standards and commitment to wildlife, animal welfare and quality that set them apart.

However, a major hurdle for the business is that it is on the initial route for phase two of HS2 which would destroy the farm. Ed has spent a lot of time liaising with councillors, MPs and others but ultimately it is something out of their control. Despite this, they are optimistic and Jo says she can see more of a future now, whereas before Ed’s involvement in the business she seemed to be working non-stop going nowhere.

The Partnership of the Year category was judged by industry leaders including Vickie Robinson, Deputy Editor of the Farmers Guardian, Stuart Thomson of English Food and Farming Partnerships and William Neville, Partner in Burges Salmon Law. The judges were looking for a partnership or team which is passionate about building a successful farm business.

Simon has returned to Swillington Organic Farm as our Butchery and Shop Manager.

Simon has years of experience from starting out on Butcher’s Row in Leeds Kirkgate Market to working in local butchers shops around Leeds and preparing meat for Yorkshires top restaurants when working as a catering butcher.

Simon brings this experience and desire for producing excellent quality meat to the farm as he takes over the management of the butchery and as well as the running of the farm shop from Sam who has now headed off to university.

By being full time on the farm Simon knows all about the meat we sell from field to fork. His new role in the shop means that our customers will be buying from the person that has butchered, prepared and packed the meat straight from the carcass.

As we have an on site butchery we can also prepare cuts to your requirements so speak to Simon in the Farm Shop if you need anything special or want to place an order to collect.

Simon also prepares all the cuts for our meat boxes, so if you can’t make it to the shop we can deliver to your door across the UK.

All our team share our commitment to producing award winning, top quality local and organic produce. Our unique set up means we farm, butcher and sell ourselves giving you peace of mind and fully traceable, ethically produced meat.